Better Than I Thought I Was

Better Than I Thought I Was

    After worrying so much about my video being too long, I ended up with 2:08. I was able to do this by cutting out specific parts of the video which I talked about in my past post.

    I was able to add to parts I was forced to get rid of before. I was legitimately very happy to add to the video again. This project has been my kid for so long and getting rid of parts felt like getting rid of what makes the project mine. I think I've been working on this for to long and I'm getting too attached to a video. But being able to add the parts to the video back felt like the project was perfect for the first time since i started hacking at the video like a butcher.

Precision Cutting

Precision Cutting

    Creative problems require creative solutions, I've been trying to cut this video down to the right size and have only gotten to 2:20. That was until I thought of something that could cut down the video enough. 

    I was having a conversation when I noticed the empty air between us talking. After I realized that, I looked back at conversations in the video. I noticed the amount of empty air in the conversations within the video. I knew I couldn't erase the empty air outright or wouldn't seem like a conversation and the pacing would be off. Instead I cut it out and manipulated the time between lines so it would be shorter. After doing this to a couple of the conversations, I was able to cut down the video to the actual time. Now all that is left is to fine tune the sound and little edits on the video.

These few blog postings couldn't in a million years represent accurately the effort that goes into editing this video. I've spent hours upon hours editing this. If it wasn't for being in quarantine, I would actually be in a crunch for time. So at least there's a bright side to being stuck at home for weeks.

Frustration Ensues

Frustration Ensues

    As I was editing, trying to cut down the whole project to fit into the time requirements, I ran into problems with the program. I was simply trying to add a cross fade between two clips, and for reasons unknown to me, I couldn't do it. Up to now I haven't been having any problems with the program, in fact it has been pretty great. 

    This cross fade is actually a VERY important part of the video, and without it I think it ruins the video. I might be over reacting but up to now the video has been great and a quick cut would ruin it. I decided to work on other parts of the video that still need work and return to this problem when its all I have left.

Music of My Own

Music of My Own

    For the music, we decided to use to types of songs. I start the video off with loud rock music, the goal of this is to throw the audience into a high energy situation. In the movie this is after our character is laid off and is furious. This high energy puts the audience into the characters point of view quickly.

    

    For second song, it is a more calm song that also shows what our character is feeling. It shifts from a aggressive to a somber tone, which I think is representative of realistic emotional change. We had hoped a popular artist would give us permission to use on of his songs, but since that didn't happen we have to use copyright free music. Although it isn't what we had hoped it worked out.

  

How The Tables Have Turned

How The Tables Have Turned

    I was not expecting to be in the situation that I'm in. I posted the clips we had taken on Sunday into WeVideo and organized it into the correct order and when I reviewed it, I was 30 seconds over the limit. The absolute maximum for the video was 2:10, I had the video at 2:40. Although I'm not in the situation I was worried about this isn't ideal.

    I would argue that having to shorten a video is about as hard as it is to lengthen it. I'm gonna have to decide what parts of the video are worth getting rid of and what parts need to stay. I have no idea as to how I'm going to do this as I believe everything I have is necessary, but I'm going to have to figure something out.

Getting Nervous

Getting Nervous

    I'm beginning to get nervous that we don't have everything we need. Even though we did everything we had planned and it came out great, as somebody who has filmed video project for years, I fear we didn't get everything we needed. 

    

Normally I wouldn't be this nervous but the problem is that a pandemic is beginning to affect our country. My family specifically isn't very open to the idea of me being outside of my house. Because of this, if we don't have something for our project, there isn't anything I can do about that.

 Now comes the part that I fear more than catching Corona, editing. Everything up to now has been the easy part. I'm going to be a perfectionist, fixing things by the frame, and this is gonna take forever. The irresponsible part of me wants to procrastinate but I know this is gonna be so much work that I can't do that.

Filming Aftermath

Filming Aftermath

    Yesterday we filmed everything we needed for our intro. I think I wrote about this before but we wanted to film everything in one day to minimize inconsistencies. We were able to film everything relatively quick, within 2 hours. With everything we had planned I was expecting it to take more time then it did.

    When we arrived, we organized the props we had each brought and began putting our credits on the snacks. We also started setting up the back of the car to look lived in. Something we saw coming was that we didn't have too many props so when we filmed a full trunk later we had to reuse most of our props. So it didn't look like this we used props that were less memorable. To an attentive eye, you might notice a teleporting jackets or trash.

    One problem we quickly realized is that filming in a car is actually pretty hard. We had to try a couple times to get a shot that wasn't shaky. At one point I sent Stephanie, camera person, flying across the car. Another part of filming in a car that's hard is the angles. When you plan it out, you don't realize that little parts of the car make the shots hard to get. Specifically we had a problem with the head rest of the chair and we couldn't even pull it out.

    All in all, the film process went pretty perfectly, which didn't just happen. It took weeks of dedicated planning. But in the end it was worth is to plan so extensively. 

Planning to film

Man with a Plan

    If we want to stay on schedule, the next step will be to start filming. We have everything planned but we need to make sure we have everything. What I mean by that is costume, props, and equipment.

    For costumes, we decided to use muted colors, the final decision was to use a dull yellow shirt and faded blue jeans. We hope these colors are gonna be able to give a general vibe to our character. We also decided to use flip flops because we thought that somebody who uses flip flops often is the epitome of sadness. 

    In the way of props, we have the receipts and tags designed, we just need to print them and put them on whatever we need  to. We have the snacks we are going to put the credits on, we are going to arrive on set a little aerie than we need to and set up all of the props and set. 

    As for the set design we are going to be filling the back of our car with objects from everyday life; clothes, cleaning, and sleeping. Because we don't have access to to many props for our set, we are going to reuse props where we can.

    Lastly the equipment is the easiest. We plan to film in the day with our phone. Because its in the day, we are hoping the natural lighting is going to be enough to be able to see anything we need. If not we don't have access to lighting so we'll just have to film a different day.

Target audience

Hitting our Target

Our desire to achieve representation to the extent of a female lead was outshone by the necessity to attract our target audience. In a perfect situation we would be able to appeal to both our target audience and accurate representation, but we weren't able to do this.

 
 As a drama, our movie is gonna be trying to hit the target audience of mostly women,  of ages 15-21. In order to hit our target audience, we have chosen a male lead actor. This decision was a difficult one because of our desire to achieve accurate representation within our film. In the end we decided on a male actor because we had already partly achieved accurate representation by also choosing a Latino lead.

Another aspect of the target audience is a large amount of fans of drama enjoy dramas based on society. As we are dealing with homelessness, our film would seem appealing to a large amount of drama fans

Representation

Representation

    Representation is an important part of any piece of media and we decided to represent the large amount of the homeless people in America by making our character part of the Latino community. IN the United states 35% of all homeless people are Latino, and of those people 39% are under 18. The decision to make the character Latino was made based off the fact that a large percentage of homeless people are Latino but also because of the lack of representation in Hollywood.

Latino actors are some of the least represented in media today. Only 4.5% of speaking roles are given to Latino actors./lnc. For this reason we made the decision to represent the Latino community.

https://www.nationalhomeless.org/publications/facts/Whois.pdf
https://endhomelessness.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/3rd-Demo-Brief-Race.pdf
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/26/movies/latinos-hollywood-underrepresented.html
https://dailybruin.com/2019/02/18/latino-homeless-population-found-to-be-at-disadvantage-in-outreach-programs/

props

Proper Props

    I've discussed the use of props to set the Mise En Scene before, but since were gonna be filming soon Ill need concrete decisions as to what props we will be using for our video.  

Some basic items we're gonna be using are clothes and personal items (toothbrush,comb, charger, etc.). The reason for having these items is because we want the setting, which is the inside of a car, to seem lived in. Some other props that could be used for the setting a a variety of snacks and papers. The idea that my group decided on is introducing the credits through the props so if we want to do this we will have to prepare them before we film.

    Some items we are preparing for the credits in the way of props include box of chips, receipt, and a juice box. Whether we use these items specifically isn't really important to us, what we really care about is being able to introduce the credits through items that also push the idea that the person is living in the car.

    

Group Discussion

Five Heads are Better Than One

    This week I gathered with some other people making a project to discuss any problems we've had in our individual openings. After discussing with other people what they could improve in their own openings, I presented them with my project and asked them for feedback on any material since I hadn't had any real problems with the project.

    There were only a few things that the other group members mentioned to me. First they were concerned that the duration of the video wouldn't be long enough. Second, they were curious as to how we would get our props.

   I made sure that the opening would be long enough by going back over the outline and planning out how long it will be. As for the props, my group and I are going to be discussing the different props we need to get for filming and how we're going to get them.

Costume Design

Deciding The Drip

    A part of our opening scene that has to be perfect is setting up the character so the viewer understands what they're like without having to be too heavy handed. The wardrobe of our character has to be indicative of what he is like and what his life is like. To do this we have to decide not only the right kind of clothes but also the right color.

    In general what we want our character to be using is mainly muted colors, this should be showing the viewer the bland melancholy lifestyle of the subject. The main colors my group has decided to go with are beige, gray, and white. These colors on the right should be the basic colors we want our character to be wearing to give insight to their life.

    Another aspect of the costume design that should show the viewer what the characters life is like is the kind of clothes he wears. By giving him baggy clothes and hoodies, there should be a subtle implication of a life that isn't too well organized and a person that isn't very mature. By using a hoodie like this one, the audience should be able to make that implication.